Aida Cloth Colors

I'm faced with a problem. I have cross stitch projects that I want to do that require colored aida cloth to really work right, and colored aida cloth is expensive.

Sure, I could dye it. I mean, I love to dye things. Check out these posts I did on the process!
Fiber-reactive dye
Acid dye
Dye Glossary

But it's cold out and aida is cotton, which means that it's a Fiber-reactive process and therefore full of odd chemicals that I don't like in my house. So I'm not doing that. I guess I could use Rit, but I just don't like the results I get from it (probably an error on my part somewhere in the process).

There is, however, another option!

Paint.

Yup. Acrylic paint and fabric medium.

Check it out here: http://craftykitsurou.com/paint-aida-cloth/

Mix the paint and the medium, paint it onto the aida, dry, heat set, and stitch!

I'm going to give it a try on one of Wild Violet's patterns when I get some time. You should check out their work on Gumroad! There are tons of super-cute patterns out there, and they are pay-what-you-want, and the charts are REALLY easy to read! I want to do Snow Much Fun and Bee by the Moon.

A Contest!

This ended up not getting done.

Christmas is coming, and so are the party games at work. My department is having a Santa Hat Decorating Contest this year, but they never specified that it has to be a traditional Santa Hat.

So I'm going to make one.

I seriously love witch hats. I think they're gorgeous. So I'm thinking red velvet for the pointy part, white fur for the brim (with the lining as more red velvet), a white fur pouf with a bell-rattler inside at the end of the pointy part, and a big wreath of poinsettias and pinecones and evergreen "twigs" twined with lights.

The "pointy part" will be stabilized with buckram and then shaped to droop and fold to one side. The brim will also be stabilized with buckram and have a wire around the outside to make sure that the shape holds. 

I already have the white fur in my stash, and I found almost a whole yard of burgundy stretch-velvet in the remnant bin at Hobby Lobby.

This is going to be so much fun!

Cross Stitch Pincushion - Complete!

I finished it! You can check out the original post about this project here. Grandma didn't open it while we were there, so I don't know what she thinks, but I love it.

Here, take a look!

In the original post I talked about wanting to stuff it with crushed walnut shells. In the end, I packed it full of polyester stuffing to keep it light.

I'm going to make another one for myself when I get finished with Christmas projects. Mine will be on black Aida cloth with red metallic stitching ("Psst... I know who you are... Hail Sithis!").

And then I might make one for my mom on tan cloth with a variegated pink-green thread.

Seriously, these are super fun!

I found charts for all the hold shields in Skyrim and kinda want to make one with all of those. The problem there is that there are only 9 shields. I suppose I could leave the bottom five squares un-stitched and make up a little hand-print for the 10th square.

Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself. I've got to finish my mother-in-law's gift first.